Maybe Jesus Jones Knows What He's Talking About

"Right here right now
There is no other place I wanna be
Right here right now
Watching the world wake up from history."  -- Jesus Jones

I have always had a hard time dealing with the concept of the here and now.  I mean, I get it technically, like on a timeline.  And I live it, I guess, every day, and all the time.  Like right now.  I'm experiencing the now. Right...now.  And again...now.  Now.  It's now...NOW.

But I like to know how the here and now came to be the here and now, and that's all based on yesterday, and the day before that, and all the days before that.  And I like to think about the way the here and now might affect tomorrow, and the day after that, and all the days after that.

But really, that's why acting is so different and therapeutic for me.  Because it's a chance to live in the now.  Right now. Without the pressure of how the now really came to be or what now might mean later.

My first acting teacher taught me that.  We were sitting in a small, dark, studio of a classroom in upper Manhattan.  I was a fresh-out-of-high-school-18-year-old of a girl.  I remember just  sitting there in the dark.  My acting teacher would make us sit there and just listen, eyes closed, completely still, and just listen.  To the sounds of our breathing.  To the cars passing the windows.  To the sirens.  To the horns honking.  To the students walking by, outside the door.  And the breathing of the person next to you.  The fans blowing.  And the sound of your own thoughts--those were loud.  Really, REALLY loud.  Louder than all the other things put together. 

While talking with Rivers Cuomo the other night, (the fact that it was while I was sleeping makes the conversation no less poignant than it would be otherwise,)  he was sitting on some cement steps coming up from a basement porch.  I was facing him with my back to the door of the apartment.  It was as if I was leaving the house for the evening.  And he said something that hit me like it had never hit me before, he said, "You know what's the most important thing? The most important thing is what's..." And without missing a beat, I said in sync with him "right here, right now." 

So since our little chat, I've been pondering the right here and right now.  What is happening right here right now?  Who is with me right here, right now? 

But what I experienced there in that acting class, that day, for maybe the first time, was Now.  The silence.  The meditation.  The Now.  I had never experienced quite that way before.  The presence of myself, and everyone in the room, but none of it at all at the same time.  The Now.

And now, here we are.  Today.  Now.  In the now.  And what are we hearing?  What are you hearing?  When  do you listen?  I mean, really, really listen.  Who are you listening to?  Whose voice are you hearing in the Now?  What is it saying?  Are you hiding from Now so you don't have to hear it? 

(Written 10/18/2018 12:17am)